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In recent years, discussions on revitalizing rural areas have become heated. Documents published by the media and local governments are sounding the alarm about "population decline" and "diminished community functions."

The measures being put forward for revitalizing the region are to "move away from reliance on attracting large corporations" and "move away from reliance on public works." There is a need to move away from the centralized social system of the past and build an "autonomous decentralized society (a society in which each region is independent by making use of its own characteristics and finds its own way of development)."

In this climate, an increasing number of young people are considering "U-turning" to change jobs and return to the hometowns where they were born and raised. When Mynavi Inc. asked men and women aged 20-39 nationwide who had made a U-turn change of job about the reasons for their decision, the most common answer among those in their 20s was "because I love my hometown and wanted to contribute to it" at 31.3%, followed by "because it's easier financially in my hometown" and "because the living environment is more fulfilling in my hometown" (both at 27.3%). Compared to other age groups, they appear to have a stronger love for their hometowns and are more likely to choose to change jobs in order to maintain ties with local friends and colleagues.

When considering the future of local communities, the trend of talented young people in cities returning to their hometowns for rural areas offers great potential. With an increasing number of young people who want to return to their hometowns to find work or start something new to revitalize their town, it may become possible to create an autonomous decentralized society.

I have been conducting research on the topic of high school education for many years. In recent years, I have been conducting field research on the main theme of "sociology of education for regional human resource development."

In the remote islands and mountainous areas of Shimane Prefecture, where I conducted my research, there are examples of successful local revitalization being found through "high school attractiveness projects" that utilize "education that makes use of local characteristics." Here, I would like to consider the role that high schools play in "forming an autonomous decentralized society" while citing some specific cases.

The Dozen region of the Oki Islands, 60km off the coast of Shimane Prefecture, is the only high school in the region, Oki Dozen High School. After graduating, many of the island's young people move to urban areas to continue their education or find employment, leading to a decline in population and an extremely aging region with a low birth rate. Around 1998, there were about 70 new students at Dozen High School, but by 2008, this number had dropped to less than half, just 28, and the region was facing the threat of closure and consolidation.

The loss of the school is an immeasurable loss for the local community. There will be no young people between the ages of 15 and 18 on the island. If children start attending high schools outside the island, the family finances will be strained by the need to send money home, and this will lead to an exodus of entire families from the island. Furthermore, the number of young families with children returning to the island or moving there will decrease dramatically, leading to an unstoppable trend in the extremely low birthrate and aging population.

Against this backdrop of a sense of crisis, the Dozen region launched the "Dozen High School Attractiveness Project" in 2008. The goal is to develop attractive people and a sustainable region by creating an attractive high school that children want to go to, parents want to send their children to, and local residents want to make use of.

Dozen High School has established a Regional Creation Course in addition to the Advanced Course since the beginning of its efforts to make the school more attractive. In the Regional Creation Course, the school implemented internships (work experience at local companies and facilities), local studies to develop human resources rooted in the community, problem-solving learning to improve overall abilities, and practical training and exercises that utilize local human resources and resources. In 2015, the school was designated as a Super Global High School (SGH) by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology, and its concept was to "develop 'glocal human resources' that will realize global regional creation from remote islands," taking advantage of the characteristics of being a high school on a remote island. For students entering in 2016, the school went one step further and decided to stop the course system and have all students study "glocal history" and "regional life studies." The former is a subject that teaches history from both local and global perspectives. The latter is a cross-disciplinary school-set subject that is conducted with an awareness of the following four connections, and teaches independence and collaboration in the local community. The four connections are: (1) connections between high school (study) and the local community (practice), (2) connections between subject areas, (3) connections between the local community (practice) and oneself, and (4) connections between learning at high school and one's life and career after entering society.

Outside of class, Dozen High School is famous for its "Hitotsunagi" event, which is held every year by its students in the Hitotsunagi Club, with 10 students from junior and senior high schools across Japan and the Dozen area participating. In addition, in 2016, Dozen High School hosted the "Machizukuri Koshien (Glocal Olympic) 2016."

Shimane Prefecture's high schools that are working to make their schools more attractive do not prioritize results (goals) first, but instead place importance on the process of teachers and students, and students working together to devise and create lessons, so their approaches (learning methods) evolve every year. By the time you are reading this, Dozen High School's approaches (learning methods) may have evolved even further.

Dozen High School's efforts have been well-received, and the number of students has increased since 2012, with 45 students enrolling in 2013 and 65 in 2015. Currently, roughly half of the students are from outside the island, and children with a wide range of interests, such as local revitalization and international contributions, are enrolling at the school.

The effort to create an attractive high school has resulted in tapping into the potential needs of young people who want to continue living in their hometown and work and contribute to their hometown. In addition, as the number of island exchange students has increased, there are cases where parents also move to the area, and there are also families who move to the area with their elementary and junior high school students with the strong desire to send them to Dozen High School.

Following the success of the Dozen region, Shimane Prefecture launched the "Project to Make High Schools More Attractive and Revitalized in Remote Islands and Mountainous Areas" in 2011. The highlight of this project is "education that makes use of the characteristics of the region," in which the region becomes the educational material and contribution to the region is the educational goal. As a result, "high schools becoming more attractive" and "regions becoming more attractive" are occurring simultaneously, as shown below.

(1) Participation of residents and towns: Shimane Prefecture is promoting "education that makes use of local characteristics" by enabling local governments and residents to provide personnel and financial support to high schools through the "Project to Make High Schools in Remote Islands and Mountainous Regions More Attractive."

(2) Increase in students from outside the prefecture: The increase in students from outside the prefecture due to the "island study abroad" system and other measures has the effect of preventing "education that makes use of regional characteristics" from becoming inward-looking and breaking down the "fixed relationships among students" that is common in schools in rural areas.

(3) Career education tailored to local industries: Students will develop a local entrepreneurial spirit by taking part in actual town development, product development, etc. This type of career education will lead to the effective use of local resources through sixth-sector industrialization, and will contribute to acquiring funds from outside the region and preventing the outflow of funds from within the region.

(4) Decentralization and independence: By having U-turners and I-turners participate in local events and discussions, new forces and new ideas are introduced to the community. As a result, a culture of considering local issues as “our own” and proposing solutions is fostered.

(5) "Young people, outsiders, fools" ... In revitalizing the region, there is a shortage of human resources just for "young people who have the future and energy." We also need "people who can see the region from an outside perspective and have connections with outsiders and companies" and "people with the ability to break through" (fools). We will introduce the perspective and network of "outsiders" to high schools and cultivate human resources with the ability to break through through entrepreneurial education.

Regional areas have potential, but it is undeniable that they suffer from a shortage of human resources. In particular, the rapid exodus of young human resources leads to a lack of new ideas. For this reason, it is essential to once again create an atmosphere in which people in cities can move to regional areas.

In times of population growth, areas with large populations or growing populations, in other words, large cities, have been at the forefront of social issues. However, Japan's population peaked in 2008 and has since entered a period of decline. The population will continue to decline for at least the next 40 years, and it is certain that problems that have only occurred in sparsely populated areas until now will appear in any town in 10 or 20 years' time. Therefore, in the future, it will not be large cities, but rather areas that have experienced population decline and aging up until now that will lead Japan, and even the world, as "regions at the forefront of issues."

Until now, education and schools have not received much attention in the context of community development. However, by building an educational brand that makes people think, "I want to raise my children here," it is possible to stop the outflow of young people of child-rearing age and, conversely, attract families with children to return to the area or move there. Education holds great potential for changing communities. In that sense, Shimane Prefecture's success model can be said to offer great inspiration not only to other mountainous and regional areas and regional cities in Japan, but also to the downtown areas of major cities.

There is no doubt that similar initiatives will spread throughout Japan in the future, and the key to their success lies in high school education.